Marvel Studios has recently come in for heavy criticism in recent times concerning its CGI. Dating back to the beginning of the Infinity Saga on to the final battle between Chadwick Boseman’s Black Panther and Killmonger (Michael B Jordan) in Black Panther and in the other MCU films since there has been a challenge with the studio’s visual effects. One of the studios’ latest offerings, She-Hulk: Attorney at Law has not been spared any of that scrutiny but members of its creative team are sticking up for the VFX artists behind the scenes.
The team of Tatiana Maslany who stars on the new show as the titular She-Hulk along with the show’s head writer Jessica Gao and director Kat Coiro have all spoken up recently about the criticism the show has been getting as regards its CGI. When the first trailer dropped, many were not impressed with how Maslany’s Jennifer Walters looked. Per Variety, Maslany while speaking at a virtual panel for the upcoming series spoke about the brilliance of the artists “I feel incredibly deferential to how talented these artists are and how quickly they have to work,” she said while also defending the short time span the artists have to work with. Maslany went on to add later on during the panel:
“I do think that we have to be super conscious of how the work conditions aren’t always optimal and that they’ve made these amazing strides in this industry. I watch it, and it doesn’t look like a cutscene from a video game. I can see the character’s thoughts. I feel very in awe of what they do.”
Director Coiro went on to explain that while they all work closely with the VFX artists to produce the series, they are oblivious to the behind-the-scenes mechanics that go into it. “If they’re feeling pressure we stand with them and we listen to them,” Coiro said. Head writer Gao also lent a voice to the issue as well:
“It’s terrible that a lot of artists feel rushed and feel that the the workload is too massive. I mean, I think everybody on this panel stands in solidarity with all workers and is very pro-good working conditions.”
These comments have come in the wake of members of the VFX community coming out to openly and firmly criticize Marvel over the conditions under which they have to work. The MCU has seen several new releases in recent times and the minds behind the beautiful visual effects that make the story better have been stretched, with some artists calling Marvel “worst VFX management out there”. Marvel’s latest cinematic release, Thor: Love and Thunder was not spared as there were instances of widespread CGI challenges. So much so that its own director, Taiki Waititi had some controversial comments on them as well.
She-Hulk: Attorney at Law is a nine-episode comedy series that follows Jennifer Walters — an attorney specializing in superhuman-oriented legal cases. The series will also star Mark Ruffalo, Tim Roth, Benedict Wong, as well as Jameela Jamil, Josh Segarra, Ginger Gonzaga, Jon Bass and Renée Elise Goldsberry. The release date was recently moved by a day from its original August 17 debut to August 18. Check out the trailer below:
